


Prince Kevin

by fhsa_archivist



Category: The X-Files
Genre: Alternate Universe
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2005-01-12
Updated: 2005-01-12
Packaged: 2019-02-05 17:59:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,223
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12799428
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fhsa_archivist/pseuds/fhsa_archivist
Summary: One good turn deserves another





	Prince Kevin

**Author's Note:**

> Note from Haven, the archivist: This story was originally archived at [Fandom Haven Story Archive (FHSA)](http://fanlore.org/wiki/Fandom_Haven_Story_Archive), was scheduled to shut down at the end of 2016. To preserve the archive, I began working with the OTW to transfer the stories to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project in November 2017. If you are this creator and the work hasn't transferred to your AO3 account, please contact me using the e-mail address on [Fandom Haven Story Archive collection profile](http://archiveofourown.org/collections/fhsa/profile).

Alex was uncomfortable, his ankle free of the ice-pack but still throbbing. Tylenol had taken the edge off the pain, but he was still finding deep sleep evaded him, and he was tired by mid-afternoon. Around three, he'd given up his part in the discussion. `Look, somehow our enemies are working out our next move before we are. We just need to work out how. I'm gonna have a rest. Maybe a sleep will help me think of something.'

 

Walter smiled. `Okay. We'll wake you in an hour or so. In the meantime, Fox, please ask the Gunmen to come over and sweep the house again. Maybe there's a bug they missed last time round.'

 

Fox got up, the strain of not knowing where the bug was showing in his movement and voice. `Yeah.'

 

*************

 

Responding to the slight pressure and itchy sensation, Alex opened his eyes and blinked several times. There was a mouse sitting in the middle of his chest. An eerily familiar white mouse.

 

`Hi. I'm Kevin. Well, it's Prince Kevin actually, but…'

 

An eerily familiar *talking* white mouse.

 

The mouse continued. `You helped me out the other day, and I wondered if there was anything I could do in return.'

 

`What kind of thing?' Alex asked cautiously.

 

`Well, I majored in Destructive Mastication in College. But I'm also…'

 

`Destructive what?' Alex frowned.

 

`Er…chewing things.' Kevin admitted, his tiny cheeks flushing slightly. He had been taking an architecture course, but he had failed to get the required pass grade in his practical, when a freak tide of soapy water had washed away his effort at nest-building under a car. In view of his position, his father had convinced the Principal to transfer his eldest son onto a slightly less demanding course. For the future leader of his people, failure was not an option.

 

`Hey, look, just cos I released you…'

 

`Your friends wanted to kill me.'

 

Alex nodded, sitting up slowly so as not to dislodge Kevin. `Yeah, but Walter didn't mean it. You had been doing quite a bit of…destructive…whatever in the kitchen.'

 

Kevin's head dropped. `I know. I'm sorry. I wanted to bring my mother back something nice. It was her birthday the day you caught me and your cupboards have much nicer things than your neighbor's. Although he doesn't chase us.'

 

`Us?' Alex said warily.

 

`My brother sometimes comes with me. Although I'm the oldest, if something happens to me, he'll be King one day.'

 

`King?' Alex queried.

 

`Yeah.' Kevin looked vaguely uncomfortable discussing the subject. `One day.'

 

`That's nice.' Alex said encouragingly.

 

`Not really.' Kevin said. `Overpopulation, the increase in pest control services, lack of suitable habitat, people threatening to shoot us. It's becoming more difficult to survive out there.'

 

Alex found himself sympathising with Kevin's plight. Then he remembered his earlier conversation. `There is something you can do. Somewhere in the house there's a bug…'

 

`Ladybug?' Kevin said. A mid-afternoon snack might be coming up.

 

`No.' Alex struggled to think how to explain the concept of an electronic surveillance device to a mouse. `Um, it's a small thing which listens to what you say and you don't know you're being overheard until it's too late.'

 

`Oh, like my kid sister.' Kevin nodded understandingly.

 

`Kinda. Anyway, this thing's probably as small as you, maybe smaller, probably black with a wire or two sticking out. It's hidden and we can't find it. The Gunmen…never mind. Can you have a look around?'

 

Kevin nodded. `Sure. I'll get Mike and Dave to help.'

 

`Who are they?'

 

`My brothers.'

 

`O-kay.' Alex nodded, wondering if he was either dead or in the grip of some terrible mental breakdown. He had just asked a talking mouse for help finding a Consortium bug hidden somewhere in their house.

 

Kevin hopped off his chest and climbed off the bed. `I'll come and tell you if we find anything.'

 

Alex leaned down, looking at the mouse as it moved to the door. `Thanks.'

 

Walter opened the bedroom door at that moment. `Alex, who were you talking to?'

 

Alex looked across. `No-one. I was just thinking aloud.'

 

`Okay. You get any sleep?'

 

`Some. I think.' Alex said, still confused.

 

*************

 

Alex put the lid back on the garbage can and turned to walk back into the house. `I think we found your bug.'

 

Alex looked around, finally working out that the small, high-pitched voice was coming from near his feet. `Kevin?'

 

`Yeah.'

 

Alex looked down, then crouched down. Three mice surrounded what Alex immediately identified as a bug. Probably *the* bug. `Where was it?'

 

One of the other mice sniggered. `Kevin missed it. It was under your bed.'

 

Alex sighed. The one place the Gunmen hadn't been allowed to set up their various bits of equipment. Their bedroom.

 

`And it was the only one you found?'

 

`Yeah. It's the only one. How you could've missed it Kev…'

 

Kevin glared at his younger brother. `I didn't go under the bed, I just went on it.'

 

`Yeah but still, it was giving off a magnetic field which made my whiskers practically curl up. Maybe you should have taken `How to find something when it's right under my nose' in College instead of…'

 

`Hey, I chewed through the wire. You didn't even…'

 

`Guys!' Alex interrupted, straightening up. `Thanks. Hold on.' He lifted the lid off the garbage can and made a small hole in the bag he'd just dumped in it. `Here.' He remembered that the last thing he'd put in the bag was a not-quite fresh pack of ciabatta rolls. He pulled one out and tore it into pieces. `Wish your mom `Happy Birthday' from me, okay. And, um, thanks again.'

 

`Wow, Italian food. Thanks.' Kevin picked up the piece of bread, ate a little, then scampered off.

 

`Anytime.' Alex called, his hand closing around the bug.

 

Walter and Fox stood on the doorstep, watching Alex intently. `Alex, who are you talking to?' Walter called.

 

`No-one. And I've found the bug.' Alex walked back into the house.

 

`Where?' Fox demanded, examining the small device resting on Alex's open palm.

 

`In the garbage.'

 

`You went through the garbage?' Walter said, his voice a mixture of horror and disbelief.'

 

`Nah. It poked through the bag when I went to put the lid on the trash can.'

 

`Wow!' Fox said. `That's how they knew everything. We spend ages in here each night.'

 

Walter nodded, relieved the bug had been found. `Good thing it wasn't in the bedroom, or they'd have more than just what we're having to dinner to listen to.'

 

Fox giggled. Alex, Walter noticed, did not. `Alex, the Gunmen didn't find anything. Let's hope this is the only one.'

 

`It is.' Alex said confidently.

 

`How do you know?' Fox challenged.

 

`I have my sources.' Alex said, smiling enigmatically.

 

Fox snorted and went into the living room.

 

`How are you feeling Alex?' Walter said, still concerned Alex wasn't himself.

 

`I'm fine Walter. Really.' Alex smiled in what he hoped was a reassuring way.

 

Distracted as much by Fox's unconscious hip-swaying walk as Alex's sparkling eyes when he smiled, Walter lost the thread of what he had been saying. `Did you put the lid tightly on the garbage? If there are mice around, we don't want them getting in the trash.'

 

Alex nodded. `Yeah Walter. I made sure.'

 

End


End file.
